James' Mom

The "firsts" are fast and furious these days... the first hair cut, the first swim lessons, the first time to meet grandma and grandpa (my parents, that is), the first Easter, the first Mother's Day, the first Christmas...

Someone also for the first time referred to me as James' Mom!  Isn't that great?!  There's a tradition in Korea that once someone has a child, they are then known as so and so's mom or dad.  For years I never knew my aunts and uncles' names because they were always the oldest cousin's mom or dad.   OK, it's not as great for the younger siblings because the mom and dad's always referred to as the oldest's but for me, it's a lot of fun.  So now I'm James' mom.  Although according to the tradition, Monty's always going to be "Emily's dad."

You're probably wondering about the first Christmas since it's May, but we missed last year's first Christmas with James, so my mother-in-law left her tree up until James came to visit.  So now he's had his first Christmas Presents as well!  I'm so looking forward to more "firsts!"

Back to work

Sad but this is my last day of my leave... so back to work tomorrow.  Hard to believe it's been 11 weeks already!  I'm already missing J.  He's off to montessori school tomorrow.  We had hired a nanny for him but we let her go on the second day.  We didn't think she had as much experience as she led us to believe, her references never called us back, and the second day she had to take care of something and was gone for 4 hours.  Oh well, we do like the new school.

I'm still feeling a little strange about the fact that we're buying diapers and cars.  E. went out to look at a car yesterday!  She'll be driving in no time and is talking about what college she wants to go to. 

So you've all asked me how the transition is going.  It's been amazing how quickly we all bonded.  J. has quickly become the center of the family.  Now we just have to get his sleeping in hand.  Early on he slept through the night several times so we thought we had it conquered, but oh no!  He's still waking up two to three times a night.  I haven't had such little sleep since college!  And we know there was no milk involved back then : )

6 wks into our new family

I'm sure at some point, I'll stop counting the days, weeks, months that James has been with us but for now everything is still too new.  In the last few weeks, James has started using a spoon to feed himself, taking a few tentative steps, and almost definitely says Mama (not sure yet if he is saying it to me).  It's amazing to me how fast the rate of learning is!  He's so fun to have around.

The last few weeks have been busy.  We spent a part of spring break going to see Monty's grandmother in Arkansas and having James meet several more of his great uncles, aunts, cousins, etc.  While we were at the nursing home one lady asked if James was Mexican (?!)  She also asked a nurse if he was hers, despite the fact that I had been holding him the entire time.  So funny!  Apparently she didn't think he looked like me at all :)  The timing of our visit was fortuitous because a couple of weeks after we went to see her, Monty's grandmother passed away.  We were so grateful that James was able to meet her.

Attached are a few shots of our trip and some fun shots of our new routine.

Our first week home

Hard to believe we've been home for a week now.  J is so much fun!  He's such a happy chatty little boy.  Can't understand him yet, but I'm sure whatever he's saying is profound.

He loves people.  The night we got home after a 20 hour trip, he saw E and went right to her.  She was thrilled.  He then did the same for his Opa and Oma.  Needless to say they loved that too.

He's now met most of his aunts, uncles, and cousins and they all love him.  We were so concerned because we were told he has extreme stranger anxiety, but we haven't seen any evidence of it.  So far, he's been good with everyone but prefers us. 

We were also told that he is scared of dogs, but seems to be making friends with Mojo and even Cowboy for that matter.  So again, so far so good!

He's finally here!

Sorry for the radio silence.  It's been a whirlwind week!

We made it in Safely to Seoul and the agency had someone pick us up at the airport.  We did a tour of a royal palce on Friday morning and then went over to the agency to meet James and his foster mom!  They kept telling us that he has a lot of stranger anxiety, but sweet baby was a trouper and hung out in the room with us and played.  After awhile, he came over and climbed into my lap and when Monty held out his arms, he went directly into them.  How great is that?

We took him down to the doctor for one final checkup (which by the way he hated since he was sick last week and spent a lot of time there.)  Then they gave us a ton of stuff for him including a hanbok, the traditional outfit for boys and then found us a cab.  Kind of like when you take a baby out of the hospital, no more questions asked!

He fell right to sleep and then woke up when we got to the hotel.  He was cranky when we gave him his medicine, but otherwise, he's remarkably calm.  He loves to clap and see himself in the mirror.  And he slept from 10-6.  He only got up once when he realized he was in the crib himself.   Apparently he's been sleeping with his foster mom.  The entire time we were in Seoul he was happy and slept really well.  On the downside Monty got sick 2 days before we left and I got sick on the day we picked him up.  I had a tough time that weekend but on Monday I went to the doctor and got some antibiotics.

The flight itself was so great.  We were in business class and because they had a couple of empty seats, they put us in a row by ourselves.  Our son had his own seat that layed down.  Even better, he slept most of the way.  In fact for both flights he only cried because we delayed his bottle so he could take it on the way up.  We were so lucky!

More later...

We're Leaving on a Jet Plane...

Yay!  We got THE call today!  I looked down at my phone and noticed it was Oregon (where our agency is located), so I excused myself and nonchalantly left to take the call in the stairwell where I could get some privacy.  Why do I say nonchalantly?  Monty and Emily both threatened me!  They told me I couldn't get excited or say anything before we told the rest of the family.  Wow, that was sooo hard!  I called Monty and told him and had him meet me for lunch so we could call Emily and the rest of the family right away.  So excited I couldn't wait to come home and make our travel arrangements. 

We're leaving Wednesday and can pick James up a few days after that.  How great is that.  Thankfully we are using miles to fly first class (actually thanks to Liz!! who got one of the tickets for us).  It makes the prospect of the 20 hour trips not as bad.  It's great to have friends!  Thanks again Liz!

Then we'll be back on Tuesday the 22nd.  Emily gets to fly in too and skip school for a day to meet her little brother.  We're all so excited it's hard to think straight.

Anyway, wanted you all to know.  Will talk to you soon and will post pictures when we get there!

1 to 15: Years that is

So we're buying diapers, strollers, car seats and teaching Em to drive in the same year!  We're getting ready for James and this weekend we're meeting Em's boyfriend.  This is our first meeting and they've been "dating" for a year!  Crazy, isn't it?  She's growing up so fast.
 

Waiting for James

All this waiting has made me crazy and antsy so I decided to start a blog.  So here's the start of my ramblings about our lives.  And of course the biggest thing in our life right now is our wait for James!

So who's James and why are we waiting?  You probably already know, but he's our son!
About two years ago, M and I decided we wanted to adopt a baby.  I know many of you thought you'd never see me get married, much less have a baby, but that's where I am : )

So we started the long process (I never really imagined what it would be like to wait for so long, good grief, I could have been pregnant twice by now!)  Anyway, the start was pretty simple.  We already knew we wanted to adopt from Korea, since that's where I was born.  We figured it would be nice for the baby to be able to identify with one of us.  Besides, we hear the wait here and in some of the other countries is even longer!  And we weren't getting any younger.  We were lucky in finding an agency so quickly.  Thanks for the recommendation Zoe!

I never knew there was so much paperwork involved.  I felt like I was filling out documents for months.  Picture doing your taxes over and over for months on end!  We also had a social worker come to interview us.  I haven't been to therapy (yet), but I picture it to be very similar.  She asked about how we were raised, how we were disciplined, etc. for hours.  Even Em was grilled.

After all that waiting (and even more because there was a governmental delay) the great news is...I think we're close!  So introducing James Julian Jeong-wu (this is his Korean name and means bright blessing).  Right now he's 14 months and in Korea living with a foster family. 

Here's the scrapbook pages we put together for James' foster parents.